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14.2.11

ABC Soup

It's funny. When I look up this soup, every entry I find starts the exact same way it was initially described to me: "I don't know why it's called ABC Soup, and there really aren't any rules on what to put in it...".

So here's my official prognosis: ABC Soup is just an easy soup of left-over veggies and a bit of meat. If you have vegetable scraps and a piece of chicken breast sitting around in your fridge, you can make this soup. It really is a fantastic solution for when you just need to eat.

This is also [make note because this may not happen again] my boyfriend's recipe-- sort of. He taught it to me about a year or so ago when he wanted to make dinner one night, and I gradually tweaked the recipe until it reached its current state. Sometimes the vegetables change depending on what's in my fridge, and I've been using rice a lot more than potatoes, but here's the general idea:

1. Bring the broth to a boil over high heat and chop your veggies. Dump veggies into the pot.
2. Cut chicken breast down to manageable sizes if desirable. [I completely skip this step if I'm cooking the soup for an hour or more]
3. Add the chicken to the pot. Wait for the soup to return to a rolling boil, reduce the heat to medium or medium low, cover and let simmer for 30min to several hours, depending on your preference.
4. Ready to eat!

Notes:

A couple recipes make this with pork ribs or tips. I was taught with chicken, so mine is chicken-based.

The broth tastes better when you use the dark meat and pieces on the bone...the trade-off is having to pick bones out of your soup.

This soup is already an all-in-one meal with the meat and veggies and potatoes, but if you want to add more carbs, or just swap out rice for potatoes, you can stir in cooked white/brown rice right before serving. You could cook the rice right in with the soup, but this would require a bit more care and water.